Another brilliant evening at St. Martin's Church, this time helping sort out the donations cupboard. With lots of generosity in the local community, the shelves, crates and racks benefit from regular organising, so we were glad to be of help!

It was great to welcome Veronika for her first task, waving down Eve on her run past, and finding some lovely storage for Christina's bike! Meanwhile Amy, Veronika and I represented the walkers of Goodgym on this warm night.

We sorted through the donations in a room down the hallway from their cupboard, with all sorts from hats and gloves, lots of socks, plenty of shoes, clothing and toiletries! Also a shoutout to Amy's homeware section, making sure any bedding, blankets etc. were nicely organised!

With some speedy labelling and clever stacking (especially the shoes!), we filled that cupboard back up with donations sorted by themes and sizes. The folding and lifting got our biceps going and the cupboard Tetris kept our brain juices flowing! Super fulfilling task and we are looking forward to next time.

We headed down to Lillian de Lissa Primary School near Edgbaston, with a wonderful outdoor space full of nature! Our focus was weeding along the fencing area & down the main driveway. There were lots of long stems & branches to chop down with our secateurs, then crush down (with feet - like they do with grapes at vineyards!) as we bagged it all up. After trying to dodge any little thorns along the way & making sure each ladybird we spotted stayed safe, we did lots of sweeping with the ample supply of brooms & brushes. Not forgetting Amy’s double-broom sweep expertise, shifting a big weeding pile from the bottom of the driveway! We then stood back & admired what had become a much clearer space in just an hour. Laura from the school was so grateful for our help & we look forward to heading back there in the autumn months!

Watered the plants and helped to carry out a deep clean and brighten up the space!

On a warm, bright evening in Digbeth, Nancy joined for her first task with Goodgym! The two of us and Karen from Friends of the Earth made for a small yet mighty team ready for some deep cleaning and a spot of gardening.

Our focus was the side entrance, with beautiful rays of sunshine beaming through the windows! We gave the gloriously green floors a good sweep, scrub (a little like we were playing curling!) and a mop. We also got into the nooks and crannies of bookshelves and skirting boards. The plants were thanking Nancy for keeping them hydrated... lots and lots of watering can refills were in motion!

Fun evening all round and the area was looking quite shiny by the time we headed off, thanks to a great team effort!

We had a brilliant evening at St Martin’s in the Bullring, a beautiful church full of activity and friendly people. Morwenna, Nathan and I had a warm welcome from Tina and Rich, who showed us the outdoor area in need of some weeding and tidying.

What a fascinating surprise! We found ourselves looking out over Digbeth level with double-decker buses, all set with lots of tools to clear brambles, sweep paving and dig through soil. It was a big team effort from us all and a regular church volunteer, Rob, also joined in!

We were glad of the sunny evening, beautiful church architecture and lively city centre buzz all around us. We all enjoyed it and were happy to leave everything looking that bit clearer than when we arrived.